中秋节, 家

The Mid-Autumn Festival is a time for family, but many people can't afford to go home for the holiday. Especially in American universities, there's no way you can get a day off, even though the importance of the holiday can be likened to Thanksgiving. And if you can't go out of town to see your family, there's no way you can take time to go to your homeland to have the traditional reunion. I'm always homesick on this day, because I haven't spent it with my family in China in fifteen years.

There's only one thing to do, and that's to find a family here, an adoptive family.

I feel so lucky.

I have a family here. I found it in my roommates and our bunny. We accept each other for who we are, and accept our relationships with each other. We're not always in each other's business, we just know that we have each other's best interests at heart. We're not dating each other, we just like linking arms as we walk down the street. We are each very busy, but we still make each other dinner. We pile on the futon to watch romcoms and Disney movies. We go downtown for the Mid-Autumn Festival to buy mooncakes and have dinner and go up to the roof to moon-gaze.

And we take care of each other, because that's what a family does.

I have three families. I have my extended family in China, I have my immediate family in Chicago, and I have my adoptive family here at school. Someday, I might have a fourth family. We don't think of the adoptive family during the Mid-Autumn Festival, but historically, adoptive families were common in China. When I graduate, I will be missing this family, for you, my family, make this my home, and when I am homesick on this day, I will also be homesick for you.